“I am so sorry for the delay.” An apologetic smile. “A crisis came up…one even bigger than Ernesto Golding. This boy is in real trouble. Merv is still dealing with the parents, but he’ll be here soon. I know you’re a busy man, so perhaps we can start without him.”

Dee sat down opposite him.

“You were so kind to see us in the first place. Especially because I’m sure your personal feelings about Ernesto are less than laudatory.”

Decker said, “Since we’re both on a tight schedule, maybe you can tell me why everyone was so anxious for us to meet.”

“We deal with the police all the time, you know.”

“I didn’t know.”

“Perhaps I should tell you a bit about Merv and me. Our therapy is rather unorthodox in the conservative field of psychotherapy.”

“I never thought of psychology as conservative.”

“Oh, but it is!” Dee crossed her legs. Fabric rubbed against fabric, producing a swishing sound. “The field has utilized the same disciplines and methods over and over. It’s Freud and psychoanalysis, or Skinner, or some variation of behavior therapy, or Rogers and client-centered therapy, or some kind of humanism—gestalt therapy. Then there are the various therapies that deal with anxiety and fear—hypnosis or meditation or relaxation. But nothing in psych has yet addressed the fact that we—human beings—have had our core essence stripped by domestication and urbanization. We have moved from the primitive to the advanced. That’s good—don’t get me wrong—but there is still this residual part of us that longs to be harmonious with nature.”

“That’s why there are national parks, I suppose.”

“Camping, hunting, fishing…” She waved them away. “They have become hobbies instead of livelihoods. We have become such Urban Irvings that we have forgotten how we were fashioned. Not that we can turn back the clock—time steadily marches forward—but we must deal with this issue of our animalistic side. If we don’t harness it into constructive means, the destructive takes over. Hence boys like Ernesto Golding. This is a young man who needs his primitus guided to constructo rather than destrudo.”

Decker smiled. “What does that translate into?”

From the doorway, a voice boomed out, “He needs to be challenged physically, is what it translates into!”